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About this project

CANCELLED?

We had to make the difficult decision to cancel this project. On October 29th, with just 10 days to go in our campaign, we were notified by Kickstarter that an individual had filed an Intellectual Property dispute against our project. Over the next week we emailed, called, and even visited the office of the individual who's claim had caused Kickstarter to suspend our project. While we seemed to make some progress toward a resolution, it became apparent that the individual was not going to simply rescind his complaint to Kickstarter. We still firmly believed that he had no basis for his claim, but there was little we could do on our own to force him to resolve the situation so that Kickstarter would lift our project's suspension.

It was a very frustrating situation. This wasn't at all how we wanted our project campaign to finish.

We still wanted to treat our backers as best we could, and with that in mind, we made the difficult decision to cancel our project then rather than letting the campaign end while the project was under suspension. By canceling the project before it ended we kept the ability to attempt a relaunch of our project once there was a final resolution to the Intellectual Property dispute. If we had allowed the project campaign to end while still under suspension we would have essentially been holding our backers funds in limbo, without the ability for them to cancel and without the ability for us to create and deliver the product. This sounded like a terrible situation for both them and us, especially heading into the holiday season.

We truly appreciated the support of our 354 backers that had pledged $6,274 towards our project. We hope they understood our reasoning and agreed with our decision to cancel our project.

THE BOHK

The BOHK is a functioning house key with a built-in bottle opening feature. It's a bottle opener you can easily carry with you, yet doesn't condemn you to ugly pocket bulge and additional weight. Its simple yet elegant design eliminates the unnecessary key ring clutter that we all associate with conventional key chain bottle openers. Simply put, we've taken your lowly house key and made it cool. The BOHK truly is "The Key to a Good Time!"

THE DESIGN

USING THE BOHK

Opening bottle

Unlocking Door

THE BOHK STORY

This past summer we spent a night camping at the foot of an active volcano, Mount St. Helens, preparing for a strenuous hike to the rim the next morning. As we kicked back with a few cold beers around the campfire we came to the terrible realization that none of us had a bottle opener. Luckily, Chris was able to perform an amazing feat, opening beers with the butt of his pocket knife. Unfortunately, his opening technique resulted in a few of those bottles containing broken pieces of glass from the parlor trick.

We survived the incident and the hike to the rim the next morning. A few days passed before Chris presented the idea to me: A bottle opener you could carry with you without taking up any additional space on your keychain or in your wallet: The Bottle Opening House Key.

A quick search of the internet revealed only key shaped bottle openers, none that could actually unlock your front door. Neither of us could understand the point of these. Why carry something extra that looks like a key when you could just turn your key into a multi-tool of sorts - It unlocks your front door and it opens your bottles. Once we realized that we couldn't just purchase what we wanted, we set out to make it on our own.

OUR FUNCTIONAL PROTOTYPE

After taking the grinder and dremel tool to many of our own keys, and then purchasing more keys and modifying them as well, we finally arrived at a design that worked! Next, we took the handcrafted design and built a 2D CAD model that we sent off to the water jet cutter. Our first sample back was promising, but needed a few tweaks. Another round of samples from a different water jet cutter and we had great looking flat shapes. Once the grooves were machined into the blades we took them to the local key shop to have the teeth cut, and then we had beautiful, working prototypes!

Protoype #3

WHY KICKSTARTER?

We've enjoyed crafting these for friends and family, but the positive response has led to an increased demand that can't be met with our prototype construction methods. The next step in order to make the BOHK more cost effectively is to work with local vendors to launch the first production run. The Kickstarter funds will help with the material costs, water jet cutting, machining, and shipping expenses associated with the awesome rewards.

REWARDS EXPLAINED

A Thank You: This one is pretty straightforward, we thank you!

A BOHK Key Blank: A BOHK key blank is a solid brass key blank in either Schlage SC1 or Kwikset KW1 profile. See the Key Identification Helper Section for help determining what key you have. Simply take it to your local key shop and get the teeth cut to fit your front door.

A BOHK Key Cut for Your Front Door: Choose this reward if you want to receive the BOHK completely ready to unlock your front door. This does require that you first ship us a key to duplicate. We'll take your key and duplicate it on to your BOHK, then ship both of them back to you. Remember, we can only do Schlage SC1 and Kwikset KW1 profiles. See the Key Identification Helper Section for help determining what key you have.

A BOHK T-Shirt and BOHK Key Blank: Here's the BOHK t-shirt design which will be included with your BOHK key blank:

Special Edition Titanium BOHK: It's lighter, stronger, and faster than our standard brass BOHK's, but with the same great design and functionality.

Limited Edition BOHK Artwork and a BOHK Key Blank: Get your own piece of BOHK wall art to go with your BOHK. We'll take the "drop", that's the brass that's left after all of the BOHK's are water jet cut from the sheet, and cut it into 4"x6" rectangles. We'll take those and mount them in wood frames, ready for display on your wall at home or in your office.

PRODUCTION SCHEDULING

Kickstarter Campaign Ends Successfully - (Hooray, you did it!)

Week 1 - Place order for sheet material and notify water jet cutter of quantities.

Week 2 - Receive material, deliver to local water jet cutter for cutting of the shapes.

Week 3 - Pick up shapes from water jet cutter and deliver to local machine shop for groove machining.

Week 4 - Receive machined keys and apply finishing touches.

Week 5 - Package and ship.

GOAL: Ship in time for Christmas!

KEY IDENTIFICATION HELPER

The BOHK is available in either a Schlage SC1 or Kwikset KW1 key profile.

Risks and challenges

As we've progressed through the initial design and prototype phases of this project we've been able to persevere through the minor setbacks. All of the logistics have been worked out, and it now comes down to executing our plan successfully. There is a risk that any unforeseen schedule delays would extend our delivery date. Rest assured we'll do everything in our power to mitigate that risk.

The remaining challenges are mostly related to our reliance on local vendors to fulfill their commitments with exceptional quality and timeliness. They've provided excellent service during prototype construction, leaving us confident they can handle a full production run. The basic task of organizing, packaging, and shipping your finished BOHK's will be the final challenge.

FAQ

Nope, we've got it covered whether you're in the continental U.S. or abroad. Shipping is included in the reward levels. We're prepared to ship anywhere. Luckily the keys are small and light, so shipping expenses are minimal.

Kickstarter is not a store.

Pledge $17 or more
About $17

A BOHK Key Cut for Your Front Door: One standard brass BOHK cut to fit your front door! Instead of taking the BOHK key blank to a local key shop, we'll cut it for you. Send us the key that you want replicated on a BOHK, and we'll send them both back to you, ready to unlock your door.